CORRESPONDENCE.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXIX, Issue 8357, 13 February 1907, Page 6

CORRESPONDENCE.

■ ♦ r (To the Editor). Sir, —I have just been noticing the way that shepherds and drovers are treated. They are the poorest paid men in the country. A shepherd starts mustering about 3 a.m. in the morning, and works all night. Now, years ago, when a man went out early in the morning and got the sheep in the yards, he was finshed for the day, but in those days he had men who understood stock and men that would pay a good wage. They did not want their stock run more in a day than they will get over in a week. Now that .wool and stock are a good price man seems to be getting poorer wages, but, of course, they can't help that, because things are all onesided. Now just look at the drovers. I saw three drovers start at 3 o'clock in the morning and drove on until 6 o'clock at night. Next morning they had to go on trucking at 2 o'clock and as soon as they had finished trucking they asked them to go for another mob of sheep, and all they get is 10s a day for a horse and four dogs. A man would need to be made of steel for the running round he gets. Of course, there is the man who goes "raddling. '' He gets a better wage than the drover. Now most of the men that are raddling are old shepherds or drovers, so, of course, when tfyey get in the higher position they forget they were at the work themselves; but they are like Jack Jones -since they came into a "little bit of splosh," they dunno' where they ar'. - I am etc., FAIR PLAY, Masterton, February 12th, 1907.